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An Outline of Occult Science

III

SLEEP AND DEATH

IT IS NOT possible to penetrate into the nature of waking
consciousness without observing the state through which the human
being passes during sleep, and it is impossible to solve the riddle of
life without considering death. For a human being in whom there is no
feeling for the significance of supersensible knowledge, doubts may
arise in regard to such knowledge because of the way in which it
carries on its considerations regarding sleep and death. Supersensible
knowledge is able to understand the motives that give rise to such a
distrust. For it is quite comprehensible when someone says that man is
here for an active, purposeful life and his accomplishments are based
upon his devotion to it; furthermore, that the occupation with states
such as sleep and death can only result from an inclination to idle
dreaming and can only lead to empty imaginings. The rejection of what
is thus held to be fantastic may readily be looked upon as
the expression of a healthy soul, and an inclination toward idle
dreaming of this kind as something unhealthy, characteristic of
persons lacking in vital energy and the joy of life, and who are
incapable of real accomplishment. It is wrong to declare
forthwith that such an opinion is false, for it contains a certain
kernel of truth. It is a quarter-truth that must be supplemented by
the other three-quarters belonging to it, and a person who sees the
one-quarter very well, but who has no conception of the other
three-quarters, will only be made distrustful by our combating the
true one-quarter. It must, in fact, be acknowledged without question
that a consideration of what lies concealed in sleep and death is
unhealthy if it leads to a weakening, to an estrangement from real
life, and we must admit that much that has called itself occult
science in the world from time immemorial, and is practiced also today
under that name, bears a character unhealthy and hostile to life. But
this unsound element does not spring from true supersensible
knowledge. On the contrary, the real fact is the following. Just as
man cannot always be awake, he also cannot, in regard to the real
conditions of life in its widest sense, get along without what the
supersensible is able to offer. Life continues during sleep, and the
forces that are active and creative during the waking state receive
their strength and renewal from what is given to them by sleep. Thus
it is with what can be observed in the manifest world. The domain of
the world is greater than the field of this observation, and what is
known about the visible universe must be supplemented and fructified
by what can be known about the invisible. A human being who does not
continually draw strength for his weakened forces from sleep must of
necessity destroy his life. Likewise, a world concept that is not
fructified by a knowledge of the hidden world must lead to desolation.
It is similar with death. Living beings succumb to death in order that
new life may arise. It is precisely the knowledge of the supersensible
that can shed clear light upon the beautiful words of Goethe:
Nature has invented death that she might have abundant
life. Just as there could be no life in the ordinary sense of
the word without death, so can there be no true knowledge of the
visible world without insight into the supersensible. All knowledge of
what is visible must plunge again and again into the invisible in
order to evolve. Thus it is evident that the science of the
supersensible alone makes the life of revealed knowledge possible. It
never weakens life when it appears in its true form. When, having been
left to itself, life becomes weak and sickly, supersensible knowledge
strengthens it and makes it, ever and again, fresh and healthy.

When man sinks into sleep, there is a change in the relationship of
his members. That part of the sleeping man that lies in bed contains
the physical and ether bodies, but not the astral body and not the
ego. Because the ether body remains united with the physical body in
sleep, the life-activities continue; for, the moment the physical body
were left to itself, it would have to crumble to dust. What, however,
is extinguished in sleep includes the mental images, pain and
pleasure, joy and sorrow, the capacity to express a conscious will,
and similar facts of existence. The astral body is the bearer of all
this. An unbiased point of view can naturally never entertain the
thought that in sleep the astral body is destroyed along with all
pleasure and pain and the world of ideas and will. It simply exists in
an other state. In order that the human ego and astral body not only
be filled with joy and sorrow and all the other facts of existence
mentioned above, but also have a conscious perception of them, it is
necessary that the astral body be united with the physical and ether
bodies. In the waking state, all three are united; in the sleeping
state, the astral body withdraws from the physical and ether bodies.
It assumes a different kind of existence from the one that falls to
its lot during its union with the physical and ether bodies. It is the
task of supersensible knowledge to consider this other kind of
existence in the astral body. Observed from the standpoint of the
outer world, the astral body disappears in sleep; supersensible
perception must follow its life until it again takes possession of the
physical and ether bodies on awakening. Just as in all cases where it
is a matter of knowledge of the hidden things and events of the world,
so supersensible observation is necessary for the discovery of the
facts of the sleeping state in their particular form. If, however,
what can be discovered by means of supersensible observation has once
been uttered, it is comprehensible to truly unbiased thinking, for the
processes of the hidden world reveal themselves in their effects in
the manifest world. If it is seen how the revelations of supersensible
perception make the sensory processes comprehensible, such a
corroboration by means of life itself is the proof that can be
required for such things. Anyone not desiring to employ the means for
acquiring supersensible perception, indicated later on in this book,
can have the following experience. He may at first accept the evidence
of supersensible perception and then apply it to the manifest facts of
his experience. He may, in this way, find that life has thereby become
clear and comprehensible, and the more exact and thorough his
observations of ordinary life are, the more readily will he come to
this conviction.

Although the astral body, during sleep, experiences no mental pictures
and also no pleasure and pain, it does not remain inactive. On the
contrary, it is just in the sleep state that a lively activity is
incumbent upon it. It is an activity into which it must again and
again enter in rhythmical succession, if it has been for a time active
in connection with the physical and ether bodies. Just as the pendulum
of a clock, after having swung to the left and returned again to the
center, must swing to the right because of the momentum gathered in
its left swing, so the astral body and the ego living within it, after
having been active for a time in the physical and ether bodies must,
as a result of this, unfold a subsequent activity, body-free, in a
surrounding world of soul and spirit. For the ordinary conditions of
human life, unconsciousness occurs during this body-free condition of
the astral body and ego because it presents the antithesis of the
state of consciousness developed in the waking state through union
with the physical and ether bodies, just as the swing of the pendulum
to the right is the antithesis of the swing to the left. The necessity
of entering into this state of unconsciousness is experienced by the
soul-spirit nature of man as fatigue. But this fatigue is the
expression of the fact that the astral body and ego, during sleep,
prepare themselves to transform, during the following waking state,
what has arisen in the physical and ether bodies through purely
organic formative activity when freed from the presence of the spirit
and soul elements. This unconscious formative activity and what takes
place in the human being during and by means of consciousness are
antitheses that must alternate in rhythmic succession.  The physical
body can retain the form and stature suitable for man only by means of
the human ether body, which in turn receives its proper forces from
the astral body. The ether body is the builder, the architect, of the
physical body, but it can only build in the right way if it receives
the impulse for this purpose from the astral body. In the astral body
reside the prototypes according to which the ether body gives form to
the physical body. During the waking state, the astral body is not
filled with these prototypes of the physical body, or at least only to
a certain degree, for, during the waking state, the soul puts its own
images in the place of these prototypes. When man directs the senses
toward his environment he forms, by means of perception, thought
images that are likenesses of the world about him. These likenesses
are at first disturbances for the images that stimulate the ether body
to maintain the physical body. Were the human being able, through his
own activity, to bring to his astral body the images that are required
to give the right impulse to the ether body, then there would be no
such disturbance. This very disturbance, however, plays an important
role in human existence. It expresses itself in the fact that the
prototypes for the ether body do not act to the full extent of their
power during waking life. The astral body carries on its waking
activity within the physical body. In sleep, it works upon the
physical body
from without.1

Just as the physical body, for example, needs the outer world, which
is of like nature to itself, to supply it with the means of
subsistence, something similar is also the case with the astral body.
Just imagine a physical human body removed from its surrounding world.
It would have to perish. This demonstrates that without the whole
physical environment it is not possible for the physical body to
exist. In fact, the entire earth must be as it is, if human physical
bodies are to exist upon it. The whole human body is, in reality, only
a part of the earth; indeed, in a wider sense, a part of the whole
physical universe. In this respect its relationship is similar, for
example, to that of a finger to the entire human body. If the finger
is severed from the hand, it can no longer continue to be a finger; it
withers. This would also happen to the human body were it removed from
the organism of which it is a member, from the life conditions offered
it by the earth. If we were to lift it a sufficient number of miles
above the earth's surface, it would perish just as the finger perishes
that has been severed from the hand. If less consideration has been
given to this fact in respect of the physical body and the earth than
in respect of the finger and the body, it is simply because the finger
cannot stroll about on the body in the way that the human being walks
about on the earth, and because in the former case the dependence is
more obvious.

Just as the physical body belongs to the physical world in which it is
embedded, so does the astral body belong to its own world; during
waking life, however, it is torn out of this world of its own. What
happens there may be illustrated by an analogy. Imagine a vessel
filled with water. A drop within this whole mass of water is not
something isolated. Let us, however, take a little sponge and with it
absorb a drop from the whole. Something similar occurs with the human
astral body on awaking. During sleep it is in a world like itself; in
a certain sense it constitutes something that belongs to this world.
On awaking, the physical and ether bodies suck it up; they fill
themselves with it. They contain the organs through which the astral
body perceives the outer world. But in order that it may acquire this
perception, it must separate itself from its own world. From this
world it can only receive the prototypes that it needs for the ether
body.  Just as the physical body receives its food, for example, from
its environment, so during the sleep state the astral body receives
the images from the world about it. It lives there actually in the
universe, separated from the physical and ether bodies, in the same
universe out of which the entire human being is born. The source of
the images through which the human being receives his form lies in
this universe. During sleep he is harmoniously inserted into it, and
during the waking state he lifts himself out of this all-encompassing
harmony in order to gain external perception. In sleep, his astral
body returns to this cosmic harmony and on awaking again brings back
to his bodies sufficient strength from it to enable him to dispense
with his dwelling within the cosmic harmony for a certain length of
time. The astral body, during sleep, returns to its home and on
awaking brings back with it renewed forces into life. These forces
that the astral body brings with it on awaking find outer expression
in the refreshment that healthy sleep affords. Further descriptions of
occult science will show that this home of the astral body is more
encompassing than that which belongs to the physical body of the
physical environment in the narrower sense. Whereas the human being is
physically a part of the earth, his astral body belongs to worlds in
which still other cosmic bodies besides our earth are embedded.
Therefore he enters, during sleep, into a world to which other worlds
than the earth belong, a fact that will only become clear from later
descriptions.

It ought to be superfluous to call attention to a misunderstanding
that can easily arise in regard to these facts, but to do so is not
out of place in our age in which certain materialistic modes of
thought are prevalent. Those who hold such thoughts can naturally say
that it is only scientific to investigate the physical conditions of
such a thing as sleep. They maintain that although scholars are not
yet in agreement concerning the physical causes of sleep, yet one fact
is certain: that definite physical processes must be assumed as lying
at the foundation of this phenomenon. Oh! if people would only
acknowledge the fact that supersensible knowledge in no way
contradicts this assertion! It agrees with everything that is said
from this point of view just as one agrees that in the physical
erection of a house one brick must be laid upon another, and when it
is finished, its form and cohesion can be explained by purely
mechanical laws. In order that the house may be built at all, however,
the thought of the builder is necessary. This thought is not to be
discovered when merely the physical laws are investigated.  Thus, just
as the thoughts of the builder of the house lie behind the physical
laws that make the house comprehensible, so behind what physical
science presents in an absolutely correct way lies the spiritual
content of which supersensible knowledge speaks. It is true, this
comparison is often presented when it is a matter of justification of
a spiritual background of the world and it may be considered trivial.
But in these things the point is not whether there is a familiarity
with certain concepts, but rather whether they are properly evaluated
in arguing the question. Opposing theories can have so great an effect
on the power of judgment that the possibility of arriving at a proper
evaluation is entirely excluded.

Dreaming is an intermediate state between waking and sleeping. What
dream experiences offer to thoughtful consideration is a multi-colored
interweaving of a picture world that conceals within it certain rules
and laws. This world of dreams seems to display an ebb and flow, often
in confused succession. In his dream life, the human being is freed
from the law of waking consciousness that fetters him to
sense-perception and to the rules governing his power of reason. Yet
dreams have certain mysterious laws that are fascinating and alluring
to man's prescience, and that are the deeper reason why the beautiful
play of fantasy underlying artistic feeling is readily likened to
dreaming. It is only necessary to call to mind certain
characteristic dreams to find this corroborated. Someone dreams, for
example, that he drives away a dog that is rushing upon him. He
awakens and finds himself in the act of unconsciously throwing off a
part of the bedclothes that had pressed upon an unaccustomed part of
his body and had, therefore, become burdensome. What does dreaming
here make out of the sense-perceptible process? What the senses would
perceive in the waking state, the life of sleep allows to remain in
complete unconsciousness. It retains, however, something essential,
namely the fact that the sleeping person wishes to ward off something.
Around this fact sleep weaves a pictorial process. The images, as
such, are echoes of waking-day life. The manner in which they are
borrowed from it has something arbitrary about it. Every person has
the feeling that under the same external provocation, the dream could
conjure up different pictures in his soul, but they express
symbolically the feeling that the person has something he wishes to
ward off. Dreams create symbols; they are symbol-makers. Inner
processes, too, can transform themselves into such dream symbols. A
person dreams that a fire is crackling near him; in his dream he sees
the flames. He awakens and finds that he has been too heavily covered
and has become too warm. The feeling of too much warmth is
symbolically expressed in the dream picture. Quite dramatic
experiences can be enacted in dream. For example, a person dreams that
he is standing at an abyss. He sees a child running toward it. In his
dream he experiences all the agony of the thought: Oh! if the child
would only take heed, would only pay attention and not fall into the
abyss! He sees it falling and hears the dull thud of its body below.
He awakens and becomes aware that an object hanging on the wall of his
room had become loosened and, in falling, has made a dull sound. Dream
life expresses this simple occurrence in an event that is enacted in
exciting pictures.  For the present we do not need to enter into a
consideration of why, in the last example, the moment of the dull thud
of the falling object should spread out into a series of events that
seem to extend over a certain period of time. We need only keep in
mind how the dream transforms into a picture what sense-perception
would offer were we awake.

We see that as soon as the senses cease
their activity, something creative asserts itself in man. This is the
same creative element that is also present in completely dreamless
sleep and there presents the soul state that appears as the antithesis
of the soul's waking state. If this dreamless sleep is to take place,
the astral body must be withdrawn from the ether and physical bodies.
During the dream state, it is separated from the physical body in so
far as it no longer has any connection with this body's sense organs,
but it still retains a certain connection with the ether body. That
the processes of the astral body can be perceived in pictures is due
to this connection with the ether body. The moment this connection
ceases, the pictures sink down into the darkness of unconsciousness,
and we have dreamless sleep. The arbitrary and often absurd character
of dream pictures rests upon the fact that the astral body, because of
its separation from the sense organs of the physical body, cannot
relate its pictures to the proper objects and events of the external
environment. This fact becomes especially clear if we consider a dream
in which the ego is, as it were, split up; when, for example, a person
dreams that, as a pupil, he cannot answer a question put to him by his
teacher, while directly afterwards the teacher, himself, answers the
question. Because the dreamer cannot make use of the organs of
perception of his physical body he is unable to relate the two
occurrences to himself, as the same individual. Thus, in order to
recognize himself as an enduring ego, he must be equipped with the
external organs of perception. Only if a person had acquired the
capacity of becoming conscious of his ego otherwise than through these
organs of perception, would the enduring ego become perceptible to him
outside his physical body. Supersensible consciousness must acquire
these capacities, and the means of accomplishing this will be
considered later on in this book.

Even death occurs only because there is a change in the relationship
of the members of man's being. What supersensible perception has to
say about death can also be observed in its effects in the outer
world, and by unbiased reason the communications of supersensible
knowledge can be verified on this point also through observation of
external life. The expression of the invisible within the visible is,
however, less obvious in these facts. It is more difficult fully to
feel the importance of what, in the events of external life,
corroborates the communications of supersensible knowledge in this
realm. Even more than in the case of many things already mentioned in
this book it would be quite natural here to declare that these
communications are simply figments of the imagination, if no heed is
paid to the knowledge of how a clear indication of the supersensible
is contained in the sensory.

In passing over into sleep, the astral body only severs its connection
with the ether and physical bodies, the latter remaining bound
together; in death, the physical body, however, is severed from the
ether body. The physical body is left to its own forces and must, for
that reason, disintegrate as a corpse. When death occurs, the ether
body enters into a state that it never experienced during the time
between birth and death, except under rare conditions that will be
spoken of later. It is now united with its astral body, without the
presence of the physical body, for the ether body and astral body do
not separate immediately after death. For a time they remain together
by means of a force whose existence is easily to be understood. If it
did not exist, the ether body could not sever itself from the physical
body, for it is bound to it. This is seen in sleep when the astral
body is unable to tear these two members of the human organism apart.
This force begins its activity at death. It severs the ether body from
the physical, with the result that the ether body is now united with
the astral body. Supersensible observation shows that after death this
union varies in different people. Its duration is measured by days.
For the present this duration is only mentioned by way of
information.  Later the astral body separates from its ether body also
and continues on its way bereft of it. During the union of the two
bodies man is in a condition that enables him to perceive the
experiences of his astral body. As long as the physical body is
present, the work of refreshing the worn out organs must begin from
the moment the astral body is severed from it. With the
severance of the physical body this work ceases. The force that is
employed for this work when the human being sleeps remains after death
and can now be used to make the astral body's own processes
perceptible.

An observation that clings to the externals of life may say that these
are statements that are clear to those endowed with supersensible
perception, but there is no possibility of anyone else ascertaining
the truth about them. This is not a fact. What supersensible
perception observes in this realm, removed from ordinary perception,
can be comprehended by ordinary thought power after it has once been
discovered. This thought power must consider in the right way the
relationships of life that are present in the manifested world.
Thinking, feeling, and willing stand in such a relationship to each
other and to the experiences of man in the outer world, that they
remain incomprehensible if the manner of their revealed activity is
not considered as the expression of an unrevealed activity. This
manifest activity becomes clear to the judgment only when it can be
looked upon, in its course within physical human life, as the result
of what supersensible knowledge establishes for the non-physical. In
regard to this activity we are, without supersensible knowledge, much
like a man in a dark room without light. Just as the physical objects
around us are perceived only in the light, so will what takes place
through the soul-life of man be explicable only by means of
supersensible knowledge.

During the union of the human being with his physical body, the outer
world enters his consciousness in images; after casting off this body,
what the astral body experiences when it is not bound to the outer
world by means of physical sense organs becomes perceptible. It has at
first no new experiences. Union with the ether body prevents it from
experiencing anything new. What it does possess, however, is a memory
of the past life. The still present ether body allows this memory to
appear as a comprehensive, living picture. This is the first
experience of the human being after death. He perceives the life
between birth and death in a series of pictures spread out before him.
During physical life, memory exists only during the waking state when
man is united with his physical body. Memory is present only to the
extent allowed by this body. Nothing is lost to the soul that makes an
impression upon it during life. Were the physical body a perfect
instrument for this, it would be possible at every moment of life to
conjure up before the soul the whole of life's past. This hindrance
disappears at death. As long as the human being retains the ether
body, a certain perfection of memory exists, and it disappears to the
degree that the ether body loses the form it had during its sojourn in
the physical body, when it resembled the physical body. This is also
the reason why the astral body after a time separates from the ether
body. It can remain united with the latter only as long as the ether
form, which corresponds to the physical body, endures. During life
between birth and death, a separation of the ether body from the
physical body takes place only in exceptional cases, and then only for
a short time. If, for example, a person presses heavily upon one of
his limbs, a part of the ether body may separate from the physical.
When this occurs we may say that the limb has gone to
sleep. The peculiar feeling one has at that time comes from the
severance of the ether body. (Naturally, here also a materialistic
mode of thought may deny the existence of the invisible within the
visible and say that all this simply comes from the physical
disturbance caused by the pressure.) In such a case, supersensible
perception is able to observe how the corresponding part of the ether
body passes out of the physical. If a person experiences an unusual
shock, or something of the kind, a separation of the ether body from a
large part of the physical body may result for a short time. This
happens if a person for one reason or another sees himself suddenly
near death; if, for example, he is on the verge of drowning, or if, on
a mountaineering trip, he is in danger of a precipitous fall. What is
told by people who have experienced such things comes very near the
truth and may be corroborated by supersensible observation. They state
that in such moments their entire life passed before the soul in a
great memory-picture. Of the many examples that could be cited here,
only one will be referred to because it originates with a person to
whose mode of thinking all that has been said here about these
experiences must appear as idle fancy. For anyone who takes a few
steps in supersensible observation, it is always useful to become
acquainted with the statements of those who consider this science as
something fantastic. Such statements cannot be so lightly attributed
to the prejudice of the observer of the supersensible. (Spiritual
scientists may well learn a great deal from those who consider their
endeavors nonsense, and they need not be disconcerted if there is no
reciprocal affection in this respect on the part of the
critics. To be sure, for supersensible perception itself there is no
need of verification of its results through such experiences. It does
not desire to prove anything by these references, but to elucidate its
findings.) The eminent criminologist and well known researcher in many
other fields of natural science, Moritz Benedict, relates a personal
experience in his memoirs. Once, when he was near being drowned while
bathing, he saw in memory his whole life before him as though in a
single picture.  If others describe differently the pictures
experienced under similar circumstances, even in a way that lets them
appear to have little to do with the events of their past, this does
not contradict what has been said. For the pictures that occur in the
quite unusual condition of the separation of the ether body from the
physical are often not readily explicable in regard to their relation
to life. Proper consideration will always recognize this relationship.
Neither is it an objection if someone, for example, once came near
drowning and did not have the experience described. It must be
remembered that this can only occur when the ether body is actually
separated from the physical and at the same time remains united with
the astral body. If through the shock a loosening of the ether and
astral bodies also takes place, then the experience does not occur,
because there exists complete unconsciousness, as in dreamless sleep.

In the period immediately following death the experiences of the past
appear summarized in a memory-picture. After the separation of the
ether body and the astral body, the latter is left to itself in its
further journey. It is not difficult to see that, within the astral
body, everything remains that it has made its own through its own
activity during its sojourn in the physical body. To a certain degree,
the ego has developed spirit self, life spirit, and spirit man. As far
as they are developed, they receive their existence, not from what
exists as organs in the bodies, but from the ego. The ego is the very
member that needs no external organs for self-perception; it also
needs none in order to remain in possession of what it has united with
itself. The objection can be made, Why, then, is there no
perception in sleep of this spirit self, life spirit, and spirit man,
which have been developed? There is none, because the ego is
fettered to the physical body between birth and death. Even though in
sleep the ego, united with the astral body, is outside the physical
body, it remains, nevertheless, in close union with the latter, for
the activity of the astral body is directed toward this physical body.
Thus the ego with its perception is relegated to the external sense
world and cannot therefore receive the revelations of the spirit in
its direct form. Only at death does the ego receive these revelations
because, at death, the ego is freed from its connection with the
physical and ether bodies. Another world can flash up for the soul the
moment it is withdrawn from the physical world that chains the soul's
activity to itself during life. There are reasons why even at this
moment all connections between man and the external sense world do not
cease. Certain desires remain that maintain this connection. These are
desires that the human being creates because he is conscious of his
ego, the fourth member of his being. Those desires and wishes arising
out of the nature of the three lower bodies can only be active within
the external world, and when these bodies are laid aside the desires
cease. Hunger is caused by the external body; it is silenced as soon
as this outer body is no longer united with the ego. If the ego
possessed no other desires than those arising from its own spiritual
nature, it could at death draw complete satisfaction from the
spiritual world into which it is translated. But life has given it
still other desires. It has enkindled in the ego a longing for
enjoyments that can only be satisfied through physical organs,
although the desires do not have their origin in these organs
themselves. Not only do the three bodies demand their satisfaction
through the physical world, but the ego itself finds enjoyments within
this world for which the spiritual world offers no means of
satisfaction. For the ego there are two kinds of desires in life: the
desires that have their source in the bodies, and therefore must be
satisfied within these bodies, ceasing with the disintegration of
these bodies, and the desires that have their source in the spiritual
nature of the ego. As long as the ego is within the bodies, these
desires also are satisfied by means of bodily organs, for in the
manifestations of the bodily organs the hidden spirit is at work, and
in all that the senses perceive they receive at the same time
something spiritual. This spiritual element exists also after death,
although in another form. All spiritual desires of the ego within the
sense world exist also when the senses are no longer present. If a
third kind of desire were not added to these two, death would signify
merely a transition from desires that can be satisfied by means of the
senses to those that find their realization in the revelation of the
spiritual world. This third type of desire is produced by the ego
during Its life in the sense world because it finds pleasure in this
world also in so far as there is no spirit manifest in it.  The basest
enjoyments can be a manifestation of the spirit. The gratification
that the hungry being experiences in taking food is a manifestation of
spirit because through the eating of food something is brought about
without which, in a certain sense, the spirit could not evolve. The
ego can, however, transcend the enjoyment that this fact of necessity
offers. It may long for good tasting food, quite apart from the
service rendered the spirit by eating. The same is true of other
things in the sense world. Desires are created thereby that would
never have come into being in the sense world had the human ego not
been incorporated in it. But neither do these desires spring from the
spiritual nature of the ego. The ego must have sense enjoyments as
long as it lives in the body, also in so far as it is spiritual; for
the spirit manifests in the sense world and the ego enjoys nothing but
spirit when, in this world, it surrenders itself to that medium
through which the light of the spirit radiates. It will continue to
enjoy this light even when the sense world is no longer the medium
through which the rays of the spirit pass. In the spirit world,
however, there is no gratification for desires in which the spirit has
not already manifested itself in the sense world. When death takes
place, the possibility for the gratification of these desires is cut
off. The enjoyment of appetizing food can come only through the
physical organs that are used for taking in food: the palate, tongue,
and so forth. After throwing off the physical body man no longer
possesses these organs. But if the ego still has a longing for these
pleasures, this longing must remain ungratified. In so far as this
enjoyment is in accord with the spirit, it exists only as long as the
physical organs are present. If it has been produced by the ego,
without serving the spirit, it continues after death as desire, which
thirsts in vain for satisfaction. We can only form an idea of what now
takes place in the human being if we think of a person suffering from
burning thirst in a region in which water is nowhere to be found.
This, then, is the state of the ego, in so far as it harbors, after
death, the unextinguished desires for the pleasures of the outer world
and has no organs with which to satisfy them. Naturally, we must
imagine the burning thirst that serves as an analogy for the
conditions of the ego after death to be increased immeasurably, and
imagine it spread out over all the other still existing desires for
which all possibility of satisfaction is lacking. The next task of the
ego consists in freeing itself from this bond of attraction to the
outer world. In this respect the ego has to bring about a purification
and emancipation within itself. All desires that have been created by
it within the body and that have no inherent rights within the
spiritual world must be rooted out.  Just as an object takes fire and
is consumed, so is the world of desires, described above, consumed and
destroyed after death. This affords us a glimpse into the world that
supersensible knowledge designates as the consuming fire of the
spirit. All desires of a sensual nature, in which the sensual is
not an expression of the spirit, are seized upon by this
fire. The ideas that supersensible knowledge must give in
regard to these processes might be found to be hopeless and awful. It
might appear terrifying that a hope, for whose realization sense
organs are necessary, must change into hopelessness after death; that
a desire, which only the physical world can satisfy, must turn into
consuming deprivation. Such a point of view is possible only as long
as one does not consider the fact that all wishes and desires, which
after death are seized by the consuming fire, in a higher
sense represent not beneficial but destroying forces in life. By means
of such destructive forces, the ego tightens the bond with the sense
world more strongly than is necessary in order to absorb from this
very sense world what is beneficial to it. This sense world is a
manifestation of the spirit hidden behind it. The ego would never be
able to enjoy the spirit in the form in which it is able to manifest
through bodily senses alone, did it not want to use these senses for
the enjoyment of the spiritual within the sense world. Yet the ego
deprives itself of the true spiritual reality in the world to the
degree that it desires the sense world without the spirit. If the
enjoyment of the senses, as an expression of the spirit, signifies an
elevation and development of the ego, then an enjoyment that is not an
expression of the spirit signifies the impoverishing, the desolation
of the ego. If a desire of this kind is satisfied in the sense world,
its desolating effect upon the ego nevertheless remains. Before death,
however, this destructive effect upon the ego is not apparent.
Therefore the satisfaction of such desires can produce similar desires
during life, and man is not at all aware that he is enveloping
himself, through himself, in a consuming fire. After
death, what has surrounded him in life becomes visible, and by
becoming visible it appears in its healing, beneficial consequences. A
person who loves another is certainly not attracted only to that in
him which can be experienced through the physical organs. But only of
what can thus be experienced may it be said that it is withdrawn from
perception at death; just that part of the loved one then becomes
visible for the perception of which the physical organs were only the
means. Moreover, the only thing that then hinders that part from
becoming completely visible is the presence of the desire that can
only be satisfied through physical organs. If this desire were not
extirpated, the conscious perception of the beloved person could not
arise after death. Considered in this way, the picture of
frightfulness and despair that might arise in the human being
concerning the events after death, as depicted by supersensible
knowledge, must change into one of deep satisfaction and consolation.

The first experiences after death are different in still another
respect from those during life. During the time of purification man,
as it were, lives his life in reverse order. He passes again through
all that he has experienced in life since his birth. He begins with
the events that immediately preceded death and experiences everything
in reverse order back to childhood. During this process, everything
that has not arisen out of the spiritual nature of the ego during life
passes spiritually before his eyes, only he experiences all this now
inversely. For example, a person who died in his sixtieth year and who
in his fortieth year had done someone a bodily or soul injury in an
outburst of anger will experience this event again when, in passing
through his life's journey in reverse order after death, he reaches
the place of his fortieth year. He now experiences, not the
satisfaction he had in life from his attack upon the other person,
however, but the pain he gave him. From what has been said above, it
is at the same time also possible to see that only that part of such
an event can be experienced painfully after death that has arisen from
passions of the ego having their source only in the outer physical
world. In reality, the ego not only damages the other person through
the gratification of such a passion, but itself as well; only the
damage to itself is not apparent to it during life. After death this
whole, damaging world of passion becomes perceptible to the ego, and
the ego then feels itself drawn to every being and every thing that
has enkindled such a passion, in order that this passion may again be
destroyed in the consuming fire in the same way it was
created. Only when man in his backward journey has reached the point
of his birth have all the passions of this kind passed through the
fire of purification, and, from then on, nothing hinders him from a
complete surrender to the spiritual world. He enters upon a new stage
of existence. Just as, at death, he threw off the physical body, then,
soon after, the ether body, so now that part of the astral body falls
away that can live only in the consciousness of the outer physical
world. For supersensible perception there are, thus, three corpses:
the physical, the etheric, and the astral corpse. The point of time
when the latter is thrown off by man is at the end of the period of
purification, which lasts about a third of the time that passed
between birth and death. The reason why this is so can only become
clear later on, when we shall consider the course of human life from
the standpoint of occult science. For supersensible observation,
astral corpses are constantly present in the environment of man, which
have been discarded by human beings who are passing over from the
state of purification into a higher existence, just as for physical
perception there are physical corpses in the world in which men dwell.

After purification an entirely new state of consciousness begins for
the ego. While before death the outer perceptions had to flow toward
the ego in order that the light of consciousness might fall upon them,
now, as it were, a world flows from within of which it acquires
consciousness. The ego lives in this world also between birth and
death. There, however, this world is clothed in the manifestations of
the senses, and only there where the ego, taking no heed of all
sense-perceptions, perceives itself in its innermost sanctuary is what
otherwise appears veiled by the sense world revealed in its real form.
Just as before death the self-perception of the ego takes place in its
inner being, so after death and after purification the world of spirit
in its plenitude is revealed from within. This revelation, in fact,
takes place immediately after the stripping off of the ether body.
But, like a darkening cloud, the world of desires, which are still
turned toward the outer world, spreads out before it. It is as though
dark demoniacal shadows, arising out of the passions consuming
themselves in fire, intermingled with a blissful world of
spiritual experience. Indeed, these passions are now not mere shadows,
but actual entities. This becomes at once apparent when the physical
organs are removed from the ego and it, therefore, can perceive what
is of a spiritual nature. These creatures appear like distortions and
caricatures of what the human being previously knew through
sense-perception. Supersensible perception says about the world of the
purifying fire that it is inhabited by beings whose appearance for the
spiritual eye can be horrible and painful, whose pleasure seems to be
destruction and whose passion is bent upon a spiritual evil, in
comparison with which the evil of the sense world appears
insignificant. The passions indicated, which human beings bring into
this world, appear to these creatures as food by means of which their
power receives constant strengthening. The picture thus drawn of a
world imperceptible to the senses can appear less incredible if one
for a moment observes a part of the animal world with unprejudiced
eyes. For the spiritual gaze, what is a cruel, prowling wolf? What
manifests itself in what the senses perceive in it? Nothing but a soul
that lives in passions and acts through them. One can call the
external form of the wolf an embodiment of these passions, and even if
a person had no organs with which to perceive this form, he would
still have to acknowledge the existence of the being in question, if
its passions showed invisibly in their effects; that is, if a power,
invisible to the eye, were prowling around by means of which
everything could happen that occurs through the visible wolf. To be
sure, the beings of the purifying fire do not exist for sensory, but
for supersensible consciousness only; their effects, however, are
clearly manifest: they consist in the destruction of the ego when it
gives them nourishment. These effects become clearly visible when a
well-founded pleasure increases to lack of moderation and excess, for
what is perceptible to the senses would also attract the ego only in
so far as the pleasure is founded in its own nature. The animal is
impelled to desire only by means of that in the outer world for which
its three bodies are craving. Man possesses nobler pleasures because a
fourth member, the ego, is added to the three bodily members. But if
the ego seeks for a gratification that serves to destroy its own
nature, not to maintain and further it, then such craving can be
neither the effect of its three bodies, nor that of its own nature. It
can only be the effect of beings who, in their true form, remain
hidden from the senses, beings who can set to work on the higher
nature of the ego and arouse in it passions that have no relationship
to sense existence, but can only be satisfied through it. Beings exist
who are nourished by desires and passions that are worse than any
animal passions, because they do not have their being in the sense
world, but seize upon the spiritual and drag it down into the realm of
the senses. For that reason the forms of such beings are, for
supersensible perception, more hideous and gruesome than the forms of
the wildest animals, in which only passions are embodied that
originate in the sense world. The destructive forces of these beings
exceed immeasurably all destructive fury existing in the visible
animal world. Supersensible knowledge must, in this way, enlarge the
human horizon to include a world of beings that, in a certain respect,
stand lower than the visible world of destructive animals.

When man, after death, has passed through this world, he finds himself
confronted by a world that contains the spirit, producing a longing
within him that finds its satisfaction only in the spirit. Now too,
however, he distinguishes between what belongs to his ego and what
forms the environment of this ego, that is, its spiritual outer world.
Only, what he experiences of this environment streams toward him in
the way the perception of his own ego streams toward him during his
sojourn in the body. While in the life between birth and death his
environment speaks to him through his bodily organs, after all bodies
have been laid aside the language of the new environment penetrates
directly into the innermost sanctuary of his ego. The
entire environment of the human being is filled with beings of like
nature with his ego, for only an ego has access to another ego. Just
as minerals, plants, and animals surround him in the sense world and
compose that world, so after death he is surrounded by a world that is
composed of beings of a spiritual nature.  Yet he brings with him into
this world something that does not belong to his environment there,
namely, what the ego has experienced within the sense world.
Immediately after death, and as long as the ether body was still
united with the ego, the sum of these experiences appeared in the form
of a comprehensive memory picture. The ether body itself is then, to
be sure, cast off, but something from this memory picture remains as
an imperishable possession of the ego. What has thus been retained
appears as an extract, an essence made from all the experiences that
the human being has passed through between birth and death. This is
life's spiritual yield, its fruit. This yield contains everything of a
spiritual character that has been revealed through the senses. Without
life in the sense world, however, it could not have come into
existence. After death the ego feels this spiritual fruit of the sense
world as its own inner world with which it enters a world composed of
beings who manifest themselves as only his ego can manifest itself in
its innermost depths. Just as the plant seed, which is an extract of
the entire plant, develops only when it is inserted into another
world  the earth, so what the ego brings with it out of the sense world
unfolds like a seed upon which the spiritual environment acts that has
now received it. If the science of the supersensible is to describe
what occurs in this land of the spirits, It can indeed
only do so by portraying it in pictures. Still, these pictures appear
as absolute reality to supersensible consciousness when it
investigates the corresponding occurrences imperceptible to the
physical eye. What is to be described here may be illustrated by means
of comparisons with the sense world, for although it is wholly of a
spiritual nature, it has, in a certain respect, a similarity to the
sense world. For example, just as in the world of the senses a color
appears when an object impresses the eye, in the land of the
spirits, when a spiritual being acts upon the ego, an experience
is produced similar to one made by a color. But this experience is
produced in the way in which, in the life between birth and death,
only the perception of the ego can be produced in the soul's inner
being. It is not as though the light struck the human inner being from
without, but as though another being were acting directly upon the
ego, causing it to portray this activity in a colored picture. Thus
all beings of the spiritual environment of the ego express themselves
in a world of radiating colors. Since their origin is of a different
kind, these color experiences of the spirit world are, naturally, of a
character somewhat different from the experiences of physical color.
The same thing can be said of other impressions that the human being
receives from the sense world. The impressions that resemble most
those of the sense world are the tones of the spiritual world, and the
more the human being becomes familiar with this world, the more will
it become for him an inwardly pulsating life that may be likened to
tones and their harmonies in sensory reality. These tones, however,
are not experienced as something reaching an organ from outside, but
as a force streaming through the ego out into the world. The human
being feels the tone as he feels his own speaking or singing in the
sense world, but he knows that in the spiritual world these tones
streaming out from him are at the same time manifestations of other
beings poured out into the world through him. A still higher
manifestation takes place in the land of spirit beings when the tone
becomes spiritual speech. Then not only the pulsing life
of another spirit being streams through the ego, but a being of this
kind imparts its own inner nature to this ego. Without that separation
which all companionship must experience in the physical world, two
beings live in each other when the ego is thus permeated by
spiritual speech. The companionship of the ego with other
spirit beings after death is really of this kind.

Three realms of the land of spirits appear before supersensible
consciousness that may be compared with three regions of the physical
sense world. The first region is the solid land of the
spiritual world, the second, the region of oceans and
rivers, the third, the atmospheric region.  What
assumes physical form on earth so that it may be perceived by means of
physical organs is perceived in its spiritual nature in the first
realm of the land of spirit beings. For example, the force that gives
the crystal its form may be perceived there, but what thus appears is
the antithesis of the form it assumes in the sense world. The space,
which in the physical world is filled with the stone mass, appears to
spiritual vision as a kind of cavity. Around this cavity, however, the
force is visible that gives form to the stone. The color the stone
possesses in the physical world is experienced in the spiritual world
as the complementary color. Thus a red stone appears greenish in the
spirit land and a green stone, reddish. The other characteristics also
appear In their complementary forms. Just as stones, earth masses, and
so forth, make up the solid land  the continental regions  of the
physical world, so the structures described above compose the
solid land of the spirit world.  Everything that is life within
the sense world is the oceanic region in the spirit world. Life to the
physical eye is manifest in its effects in plants, animals, and men.
Life to spiritual vision is a flowing entity that permeates the land
of spirits like seas and rivers. A still better analogy is that of the
circulation of the blood in the body, for whereas oceans and rivers
appear irregularly distributed within the physical world, there is a
certain regularity, like that of the circulation of the blood, in the
distribution of this streaming life of the land of spirit beings. This
flowing life is heard simultaneously as a spiritual entoning.  The
third realm of the spirit land is its atmosphere. What
appears in the sense world as sensation exists in the spiritual realm
as an all-pervading presence like the earth's air. Here we must
imagine a sea of flowing feeling. Sorrow and pain, joy and delight
flow through this realm like wind or a raging tempest in the
atmosphere of the sense world. Imagine a battle raging upon earth. Not
only human forms confront each other there, forms that can be seen
with the physical eyes, but feelings stand forth opposing feelings,
passions opposing passions. The battlefield is filled with pain as
well as with human forms. Everything that is experienced there of the
nature of passion, pain, joy of conquest, is present not alone in its
effects perceptible to the senses, but the spiritual sense becomes
conscious of it as atmospheric processes in the land of spirits. Such
an event in the spirit is like a thunder storm in the physical world,
and the perception of these events may be likened to the hearing of
words in the physical world. Therefore it is said that just as the air
surrounds and permeates the earth beings, so do wafting
spiritual words enclose the beings and processes of the spirit
land.

There are still other perceptions possible in this spiritual world.
What may be compared to warmth and light of the physical world is also
present. What permeates everything in the spirit land, like warmth
permeating earthly things, is the thought world itself, only here,
thoughts must be imagined as living, independent entities. What is
apprehended as thoughts in the physical world is like the shadow of
what exists in the land of spirits as thought beings. If we imagine
thought, as it exists in human beings, withdrawn from man and endowed
as an active entity with its own inner life, then we have a feeble
illustration of what permeates the fourth region of the spirit land.
What man perceives as thoughts in his physical world between birth and
death is only the manifestation of the thought world as it is able to
express itself through the instrumentality of the bodies. But all such
thoughts entertained by human beings, which signify an enrichment of
the physical world, have their origin in this region. One need not
think here merely of the ideas of the great inventors, of the
geniuses. It can be seen how every person has sudden ideas that he
does not owe merely to the outer world, but with which he transforms
this outer world itself. Feelings and passions whose causes lie in the
outer world have to be placed in the third region of the spirit land.
But everything that can so live in the human soul as to make him a
creator, causing him to transform and fructify his surroundings, is
perceptible in its primeval, essential form in the fourth sphere of
the spiritual world.  What exists in the fifth region may be compared
with physical light. It is wisdom revealing itself in its innermost
form. Beings belonging to this region shed wisdom upon their
environment, just as the sun sheds light upon physical beings. What is
illuminated by this wisdom appears in its true significance and
meaning for the spiritual world, just as a physical object displays
its color when it is shone upon by the light.  There exist still higher
regions of the land of the spirits, descriptions of which will be
found in a later part of this work.

After death, the ego is immersed in this world, together with the
harvest that it brings with it from its life in the sense world. This
harvest is still united with that part of the astral body that has not
been thrown off at the end of the period of purification. Only that
part falls away which after death was inclined with its desires and
longings toward physical life. The immersion of the ego in the
spiritual world, together with what it has acquired in the sense
world, may be compared with the insertion of a seed into the ripening
earth. Just as this seed draws substances and forces from its
environment in order to develop into a new plant, so, too, unfolding
and growth is the very essence of the ego being embedded in the world
of spirit.  Within what an organ perceives lies hidden the force by
means of which the organ itself is created. The eye perceives the
light, but without the light there would be no eye. Beings that pass
their lives in darkness develop no organs of sight. In this manner the
whole bodily organism of the human being is created out of the hidden
forces lying within what is perceived with these bodily members. The
physical body is built up by the forces of the physical world, the
ether body by those of the life world, and the astral body is formed
out of the astral world. When the ego is now transplanted into the
spirit land, it encounters those forces that remain hidden to physical
perception. In the first region of the spirit land the spiritual
beings are perceptible who always surround the human being and who
have also fashioned his physical body. Thus in the physical world, man
perceives nothing but the manifestations of those spiritual forces
that have also formed his own physical body. After death, he is
himself in the midst of these formative forces that now appear to him
in their own, previously concealed, form. Likewise, in the second
region he is in the midst of the forces composing his ether body. In
the third region, forces stream toward him out of which his astral
body has been organized. The higher regions of the spirit land also
now impart to him what composes his form in his life between birth and
death.

These beings of the spirit world now co-operate with what man has
brought with him as fruit from the former life and what now becomes a
seed. By means of this cooperation man is built up anew as a spiritual
being. In sleep the physical and ether bodies continue their
existence; the astral body and ego are, to be sure, outside of these
two bodies, but still united with them. Whatever influences the astral
body and the ego receive in this state from the spiritual world can
only serve to restore the forces exhausted during the waking period.
When the physical and ether bodies have been laid aside, however, and
when, after the period of purification, those parts of the astral body
that are still connected with the physical world through their desires
are also laid aside, all that streams toward the ego from the spirit
world now becomes not only a perfector, but a recreator. After a
certain length of time, which will be discussed in later parts of this
work, an astral body has formed itself around the ego; the former can
again dwell in ether and physical bodies befitting the human being
between birth and death. He can again pass through birth and appear in
a new earth existence into which the fruit of the previous life has
been incorporated. Up to the time of re-forming a new astral body, man
is a witness of his own re-creation. Since the powers of the spirit
land do not reveal themselves to him by means of outer organs, but
from within, like his own ego in self-consciousness, he is able to
perceive this revelation as long as his mind is not yet directed to an
outwardly perceptible world. The moment, however, the astral body is
newly formed, his attention turns outward. The astral body once more
requires an external ether and physical body. It therefore turns away
from the revelations of the inner world. For this reason an
intermediate state now begins, during which man sinks into
unconsciousness. Consciousness can only reappear in the physical world
when the necessary organs for physical perception have been formed.
During this period in which consciousness, illuminated by inner
perception, ceases, the new ether body begins to attach itself to the
astral body and the human being can then again enter into a physical
body. Only an ego that has of itself produced life spirit and spirit
man, the hidden, creative forces in the ether and physical bodies,
would be able to take part consciously in the attachment of these two
members. As long as man is not developed to this point, beings who are
further advanced than he in their evolution must direct the attachment
of these members. The astral body is led by such beings to certain
parents, so that he may be endowed with the proper ether and physical
bodies.  Before the attachment of the ether body is completed,
something extraordinarily significant occurs for the human being who
is re-entering physical existence. He has, in his previous life,
created destructive forces that became evident when he experienced his
life in reverse order after death. Let us take again the example
suggested above. A person had caused someone pain in an outburst of
anger in the fortieth year of his previous life. After death, he met
this pain of the other person in the form of a force destructive to
the development of his own ego. So it is with all such occurrences of
his previous life. On re-entering physical life, these hindrances to
evolution confront the ego anew. Just as at death a kind of memory
picture of the past life arose before the human ego, now a pre-vision
of the coming life presents itself. Again he sees a tableau, which
this time displays all the hindrances he must remove if his evolution
is to make further progress. What he thus sees becomes the starting
point of forces that he must carry with him into a new life. The
picture of the pain that he has caused another person becomes the
force impelling the ego, on re-entering life, to make reparation for
this pain. Thus the previous life has a determining effect upon the
new life. The actions of this new life are in a certain way caused by
those of the previous life. This orderly connection between a former
and a later existence must be considered as the law of destiny. It has
become the custom to designate this law by the name karma, a term
borrowed from oriental wisdom.

The fashioning of a new corporeal organization is not the only
activity that is required of the human being between death and a new
birth. While this building up is taking place, man lives outside the
physical world. But during this time the earth proceeds in its
evolution. Within relatively short periods of time the earth changes
its countenance. How did those regions, which at present are occupied
by Germany, appear a few millennia ago? When man reappears in a new
life, the earth as a rule presents quite a different appearance from
the one it had in his previous life. While he was absent from the
earth all sorts of changes have occurred. Hidden forces also are at
work in this transformation of the face of the earth. Their activities
proceed from the same world in which man dwells after death, and he
himself must co-operate in this transformation of the earth. He can do
so only under the guidance of higher beings, as long as he has not
acquired, through the development of life spirit and spirit man, a
clear consciousness concerning the relationship between the spirit and
its expression in the physical. But he helps to transform the earthly
conditions. It can be said that human beings, during the period
between death and a new birth, transform the earth in such a way that
its conditions harmonize with their own development. If we observe a
particular spot on the earth at a definite point of time and observe
it again after a long span, finding it in a fully changed condition,
the forces that have wrought this change are the forces of the human
dead. In this way men have a relationship with the earth also during
the period between death and a new birth. Supersensible consciousness
sees in all physical existence the manifestation of a hidden
spirituality. For physical observation, it is the light of the sun,
climatic changes, and similar phenomena that bring about the
transformation of the earth. For supersensible observation, the forces
of the human dead are active in the rays of light that fall upon the
plants from the sun. By observing supersensibly one becomes aware of
how human souls hover above the plants, how they change the surface of
the earth, and so forth. The attention of the human being is not only
turned upon himself and upon the preparation for his own new earth
life; indeed, he is called upon to work spiritually upon the outer
world, just as he is called upon to work physically in the life
between birth and death.

Not only from the land of spirit beings does human life affect the
conditions of the physical world, however, but, vice versa, all
activity in physical existence has its effects in the spiritual world.
An example will illustrate what happens in this respect. A bond of
love exists between mother and child. This love arises out of an
attraction between the two that has its roots in the forces of the
sense world. But it changes in the course of time; a spiritual bond is
formed more and more out of the sensory, and this spiritual link is
fashioned not merely for the physical world, but also for the land of
spirits. This is also true for other relationships. What has been spun
in the physical world through spiritual beings remains in the
spiritual world. Friends who have become closely united in life belong
together also in the land of spirits and, after laying aside their
bodies, they are in much more intimate communion than in physical
life. For as spirits they exist for each other through the
manifestation of their inner nature in the same way that the higher
spiritual beings manifest their existence to one another through their
inner nature, as we have described above, and a tie that has been
woven between two people brings them together again in a new life.
Therefore, in the truest sense of the word, we must speak of people
finding each other again after death.

What has once taken place with a person, during the period from birth
to death and then from death to a re-birth, repeats itself. Man
returns to earth again and again when the fruit that he has acquired
in one physical life has reached maturity in the land of the spirits.
Yet, we must not think here of repetition without beginning and end,
for the human being passed, at some time, from other forms of
existence into those that take place in the manner described, and he
will in the future pass on to others. A picture of these transitional
stages will be presented when, subsequently, the evolution of the
cosmos  in relation to man  is described from the standpoint of
supersensible consciousness.

The processes that occur between death and a new birth are, naturally,
still more concealed for outer sensory observation than the spiritual
element that underlies manifest existence between birth and death.
This sensory observation can see the effects of this part of the
concealed world only where they enter into physical existence. The
question for sensory observation is, whether the human being who
passes through birth into life brings with him something of the
processes described by supersensible cognition as taking place between
a previous death and birth. if someone finds a snail shell in which no
trace of an animal is to be seen, he will nevertheless acknowledge
that this snail shell has come into existence through the activity of
some animal and will not believe that it has been constructed in its
form purely by means of physical forces. Likewise, a person who
observes a living human being and finds something that cannot have its
origin in this life, can admit with reason that it originates in what
the science of the supersensible described, if thereby a clarifying
light is thrown upon what is otherwise inexplicable. Thus intelligent
sensory observation would be able to find that the invisible causes
are comprehensible through their visible effects, and to anyone who
observes this physical life entirely without prejudice, the above will
appear  with every new observation  more and more convincing. It is only
a question of finding the right standpoint for observing the effects
in outer life. For example, where are the effects of what
supersensible cognition describes as processes of the time of
purification? How do the effects of the experiences that man undergoes
manifest themselves after this time of purification in the purely
spiritual realm, according to the evidence of spiritual research?

Problems enough force themselves into every earnest and deep
consideration of life in this field. We see one person born in need
and misery, equipped with only meager ability, and he appears to be
predestined to a pitiable existence because of the conditions
prevailing at his birth. Another will, from the first moment of his
life, be cherished and cared for by solicitous hands and hearts;
brilliant capacities unfold in him, he is cut out for a fruitful,
satisfactory existence. Two contrasting points of view can be asserted
in respect of such problems. The one adheres to what the senses
perceive and what the intellect, bound to the senses, can grasp. This
point of view sees no problem in the fact that one person is born to
good fortune, the other to misfortune. Although such a point of view
may not wish to use the word chance, still those who hold
it are not ready to assume an interrelated web of laws that causes
such diversities, and with respect to aptitudes and talents, this way
of thinking adheres to what is said to be inherited from
parents, grandparents, and other ancestors. It will refuse to seek the
causes in spiritual events that man himself has experienced before his
birth, and through which he has formed his capacities and talents,
quite apart from the hereditary descent from his ancestors.  Another
point of view will not feel satisfied with such an interpretation. It
will hold that even in the outer world nothing occurs at a definite
place or in definite surroundings without the necessity of
presupposing a reason for the cause of it. Although in many instances
these causes have not yet been investigated, yet they exist. An Alpine
flower does not grow in the lowlands; there is something in its nature
that unites it with the Alpine regions. Likewise, there must be
something in a human being that causes him to be born in a definite
environment. This is not to be explained by causes that lie merely in
the physical world. To a serious thinker this must appear as though a
blow dealt another should be explained not by the feelings of the
aggressor, but rather by the physical mechanism of his hand.  Those who
have this point of view must also be dissatisfied with all
explanations of aptitude and talents as mere inheritance. Yet it may
be said in this connection that obviously certain aptitudes continue
to be inherited in families. During two and a half centuries musical
aptitudes were inherited by the members of the Bach family. Eight
mathematicians, some of whom in their childhood were destined for
quite different professions, have appeared in the Bernoulli family.
The inherited talents have always impelled them to take up
the family profession. Furthermore, it can be shown through exact
investigation of the line of ancestry of an individual that, in one
way or another, the talents of this individual have appeared in the
ancestors and that they present only a summation of inherited
tendencies. The one having the second point of view mentioned will
certainly not disregard such facts, but they cannot mean the same
thing to him as to the other who rests his explanations solely upon
the processes of the sense world. The former will point out that it is
just as impossible for the inherited traits to sum themselves up into
an entire personality as it is for the metal parts of a clock to form
themselves into a clock. If the objection is made that the united
activity of the parents can bring about the combination of traits and
that this, as it were, takes the place of the clock-maker, he will
reply, Just look with impartiality at the completely new element
in every child's personality; this cannot come from the parents for
the simple reason that it does not exist in them.

Unclear thinking can cause great confusion in this realm. The worst is
if those having the first point of view previously stated look on
those having the second as opponents of what is based upon sure
facts. But these latter may not even think of denying the truth
or the value of these facts. They also see quite clearly, for example,
that a definite spiritual predisposition, even a spiritual direction,
is inherited in a family, and that certain capacities
summarized and combined in one descendant result in a remarkable
personality. They are ready to admit that the most illustrious name
seldom stands at the beginning, but at the end of a blood
relationship. But those holding this view should not be blamed if they
are forced to draw conclusions from these findings quite different
from those of the persons who merely hold to the facts of the senses.
The latter may be countered by saying that the human being certainly
displays the attributes of his ancestors, for the soul-spirit element,
which enters into physical existence through birth, takes its physical
form from what heredity gives it. But by this, nothing else is said
than that a being bears the qualities of the medium in which it is
immersed. The following is certainly a strange and trivial comparison,
but the unprejudiced mind will not deny its justification when it is
said that the fact that a human being appears clothed in the traits of
his forebears gives no more evidence of the origin of his personal
characteristics than the fact that he is wet because he fell into the
water gives evidence of his inner nature. It can be said further that
if the most illustrious name stands at the end of a blood relationship
covering many generations, it shows that the bearer of this name
needed this blood relationship in order to form the body required for
the development of his entire personality. It is, however, no proof
whatsoever of the inheritance of the personal element
itself; in fact, for a healthy logic, this fact proves just the
opposite. If indeed the personal gifts were inherited, they would have
to stand at the beginning of this series of generations and be
transmitted to the descendants. But the appearance of a great
endowment at the end of a human series proves that it is not
inherited.

It is not to be denied that those who speak of spiritual causation in
life often add to the confusion. They often speak too much in general,
indefinite terms. When it is declared that the inherited attributes
are summed up into the personality of a human being, this can
certainly be compared with the statement that the metal parts of a
clock have assembled themselves. But it must also be admitted that
many statements about the spiritual world are similar to the
declaration that the metal parts of a clock cannot assemble themselves
so that the hands move forward; therefore something spiritual must be
present that takes care of the forward movement of the hands. In
respect of such an assertion, he builds on a firmer foundation who
says, Oh, I shall not trouble about such mystical beings who
advance the hands of the clock; I am trying to learn to understand the
mechanical relationships that bring about this forward movement of the
hands. For it is not a question of merely knowing that behind
such a mechanism as the clock, for example, there stands something
spiritual  the clock-maker  but it is of significance only to learn to
know the thoughts in the mind of the clock-maker that have preceded
the construction of the clock. These thoughts can be found again in
the mechanism.

All mere dreaming and imagining about the supersensible brings only
confusion for they are incapable of satisfying the opponents. The
latter are right when they say that such general references to
supersensible beings are not an aid to the understanding of the facts.
These opponents, it is true, may say the same thing about the definite
indications of spiritual science. In this case, however, it can be
shown how the effects of hidden spiritual causes appear in outer life.
The following can be maintained: Suppose that what spiritual research
has established by means of observation is true, namely, that man
after death has passed through a period of purification and that he
has experienced psychically during that time how a definite act, which
has been performed in a previous life, is a hindrance to further
evolution. While he was experiencing this, the impulse developed in
him to rectify the consequences of this act. He brings this impulse
with him into a new life, and it then forms the trait of character
that places him in a position where this rectification is possible.
Consider the totality of such impulses, and you have a reason for the
destined environment in which a person is born.  The same may apply to
another supposition. Again assume that what spiritual science says is
true, namely, that the fruits of a past life are incorporated in the
spiritual human seed, and that the land of the spirits in which this
seed exists between death and rebirth is the realm in which these
fruits ripen in order to appear again in a new life changed into
talents and capacities, and to form the personality in such a way that
it appears as the effect of what has been gained in a former
life.  Anyone who makes these assumptions and, with them, observes life
without prejudice will see that through them all facts of the sense
world can be acknowledged in their full significance and truth, while
at the same time everything becomes comprehensible that must remain
forever incomprehensible to the one who, while relying only on
physical facts, directs his attitude of mind toward the spiritual
world. Above all, every illogical assumption will disappear, for
instance the one mentioned above, that because the most important name
stands at the end of a blood relationship series, the bearer of that
name must have inherited his talents. Life becomes logically
comprehensible by means of the supersensible facts communicated by
spiritual science.

The conscientious truth-seeker who, without personal experiences in
the supersensible world, wishes to find his way within the facts will,
however, still be able to raise an important objection. For it can be
asserted that it is inadmissible to assume the existence of any fact
whatever simply for the reason that something that otherwise is
inexplicable can thereby be explained. Such an objection is surely
wholly without meaning for the one who knows the corresponding facts
from supersensible experience. In the subsequent chapters of this
work, the path will be indicated that can be traveled for the purpose
of becoming acquainted, not only with other spiritual facts to be
described here, but also with the law of spiritual causation as an
individual experience. However, the above objection can, indeed, have
significance for the person who is not willing to tread this path, but
what can be said in refutation of this objection is also valuable for
the one who has decided to take this path. For a person who accepts
this in the right way has made the best initial step that can be taken
on the path.  It is absolutely true that we should not accept
something, the existence of which we do not otherwise know, simply
because something, which otherwise remains incomprehensible, can be
explained by it. In the case of the spiritual facts mentioned,
however, the matter is quite different. If they are accepted, this has
not only the intellectual consequence that life becomes comprehensible
through them, but by the admission of these assumptions into our
thoughts something else is experienced. Imagine the following case.
Something happens to a person that arouses in him a feeling of
distress. He can take this in two different ways. He can experience
distress over the occurrence and yield himself to its disturbing
aspects, even perhaps sink into grief. He can, however, take it in
another way. He can say, In reality, I have in a past life
developed in myself the force that has confronted me with this event;
I have, in fact, brought this thing upon myself, and he can
arouse in himself all the feelings that can result from such a
thought. Naturally, the thought must be experienced with the utmost
sincerity and all possible force if it is to have such a result for
the life of feeling and sensation. Whoever achieves this will have an
experience that can best be illustrated by a comparison. Let us
suppose that two men get hold of a stick of sealing wax. One makes
intellectual observations concerning its inner nature.
These observations may be very clever; if there is nothing to show
this Inner nature, one might easily reply that this is
pure fantasy. The other, however, rubs the sealing wax with a cloth
and then shows that it attracts small particles. There is a tremendous
difference between the thoughts that have passed through the head of
the first man, arousing his observations, and those of the second man.
The thoughts of the first have no actual results; those of the second,
however, have aroused a force, that is, something actual, from its
concealment.  This is also the case with the thoughts of the human
being who imagines that, through a former life, he has implanted into
himself the power to encounter an event. This mere thought arouses in
him a real force by means of which he can meet the event quite
differently from the way he would have met it had he not entertained
this thought. The inherent necessity of this event, which otherwise he
might have considered merely due to chance, dawns upon him, and he
will at once understand that he has had the right thought, for it had
the force to disclose to him the facts. If a person repeats such inner
processes, they become the means of an inner supply of strength and
thus they prove their truth through their fruitfulness, and this truth
becomes manifest gradually and powerfully. These processes have a
healthy effect in regard to spirit, soul, and body; indeed, in every
respect they act beneficially upon life. Man becomes aware that in
this way he enters in the right manner into the relationships of life,
whereas he is on the wrong path when he considers only the one life
between birth and death. His soul becomes stronger because of this
knowledge.  Such purely inner proof of spiritual causation can only be
produced by each person himself in his own intimate soul life, but
everyone can have such proof. Anyone who has not produced this proof
cannot, of course, judge its power. Anyone who has produced it can no
longer have any doubt about it. It is not surprising that this is so,
for it is only natural that what is so intimately connected with man's
innermost nature, his personality, can also be satisfactorily proved
only by means of the most intimate experience.  The objection cannot be
made, however, that each person must deal personally with such matters
since they have to do with an inner experience of this kind, and that
they cannot be the concern of spiritual science. It is true that each
person must have the experience himself, just as each person must
himself understand the proof of a mathematical problem. The means by
which the experience can be attained, however, holds good for
everyone, just as the method of proving a mathematical problem holds
good for everyone.

It should not be denied that  aside from supersensible observations, of
course  the proof by means of the forceproducing power of the
corresponding thoughts just referred to, is the only one that holds
its own if viewed with impartial logic. All other considerations are
certainly important, but they all will possess something that offers a
point of attack. To be sure, anyone who has acquired a sufficiently
unprejudiced point of view will find something in the possibility and
actuality of the education of man that has logically effective power
of proof for the fact that a spiritual being is struggling for
existence within the bodily sheath. He will compare the animal with
the human being and say to himself that in the former, its normal
characteristics and capacities appear at birth as something definite,
which shows clearly how it is predestined by heredity and how it will
develop in the outer world. See how the tiny chick from birth carries
out vital functions in a definite way. In the human being, however,
something enters into relationship with his inner life, through
education, that can exist without any connection whatsoever with
heredity, and he can make the effects of such outer influences his
own. Anyone who teaches knows that forces from the inner being must
come to meet such influences. If this is not the case, then all
schooling, all education is meaningless. For the unprejudiced
educator, there exists a clear-cut boundary between inherited
characteristics and those inner human forces that shine through these
characteristics originating in former earth lives. True, it is
impossible to adduce weighty proofs for these things in
the same way that certain physical facts may be demonstrated by means
of the scales. But then, these things are the intimacies of life, and
for the person who has a sense for such things, these impalpable
evidences are likewise conclusive, even more conclusive than the
obvious reality. That animals can be trained, that is, that they
acquire qualities and faculties through education, offers no objection
for the one who is able to see the essential thing. Aside from the
fact that everywhere in the world transitions are to be found, the
results of animal training do not fuse in like manner with the
animal's personal nature, as is the case with human beings. It is even
emphasized that the abilities the domestic animal acquires through
training during its life with man, are inheritable, that is, that they
have their effects in the species, not in the individual. Darwin
describes how dogs fetch and carry without having learned to do so or
having seen it done. Who would assert a similar thing in regard to
human education?

There are thinkers who through their observation pass beyond the
opinion that the human being is constructed from without purely
through the forces of heredity. They rise to the idea that a spiritual
being, an individuality, precedes physical existence and forms it.
Many of them do not find it possible to comprehend that there are
repeated earth lives, and that in the intervening existence between
lives the fruits of the previous ones act cooperatively as formative
forces. Let us mention one out of the list of such thinkers. Immanuel
Hermann Fichte, son of the great Fichte, in his work
Anthropology2
cites his observations that bring him to
the following comprehensive conclusion:

The parents are not the producers of the child in the fullest
sense of the word. They offer the organic substance, and not alone
that, but at the same time the median, sensory soul element that
expresses itself in temperament, in special soul coloring, in definite
specification of impulses, and the like, the general source of which
is fantasy in that broader sense already proved by us. In all these
elements of personality the mixture and peculiar union of the parent
souls is unmistakable; there are good reasons, therefore, to explain
these as purely a product of procreation; all the more so, if
procreation is understood to be an actual soul process. We had to come
to this conclusion. But the actual conclusive central point of the
personality is lacking just here. For by means of a deeper, more
penetrating observation we see that even those characteristics of mind
and soul are only vestures and instruments for embracing the real
spiritual, ideal aptitudes of man, capable of furthering or retarding
them in their development, but in no way capable of bringing them into
existence out of themselves.

And we read further:

Each person existed previously in accordance with his spiritual
fundamental form, for spiritually considered, no individual resembles
another any more than one species of animal resembles another.
(see Note #3)3

These thoughts only go so far as to permit a spiritual being to enter
the physical corporeality of man. Since, however, this spiritual
being's formative forces are not derived from the causes of a former
life, each time that a personality comes into existence a spiritual
being of this kind would have to emerge out of a divine primal fount.
Assuming this to be true, there would be no possibility of explaining
the relationship that exists between the aptitudes struggling forth
out of the human inner being and what approaches this inner being in
the course of life from the outer earthly environment. The human inner
being, which in every individual would have to spring from a divine
primal source, would have to stand as a complete stranger before what
confronts it in earth life. Only then will this not be the case  and so
it is indeed  if this human inner nature had already been united with
the external world  in other words, if it is not living in this world
for the first time. The unbiased educator can clearly make the
observation, I bring something to my pupil from the results of
earth life that is indeed foreign to his merely inherited
characteristics, yet is something that makes him feel as if he had
already been connected with the work in which these results of earth
life have their source. Only repeated earth lives, in connection
with the facts in the spiritual realm between these earth lives as
presented by spiritual research, can give a satisfactory explanation
of the life of present day humanity, considered from every point of
view.  The expression, present day humanity, was
intentionally used here, for spiritual research finds that there was a
time when the cycle of earth lives began, and that at that time
conditions different from those of the present existed for the
spiritual being of man as it entered into the corporeal sheath. In the
following chapters we shall go back to this primeval state of the
human being. When it will have to be shown, from the results of
spiritual science, how this human being has attained his present form
in relation to the evolution of the earth, we shall then be able to
point out still more exactly how the spiritual essential core of man
penetrates into the physical body from supersensible worlds, and how
the spiritual law of causation  human destiny  is developed.

Footnotes:

Concerning the nature of fatigue, see
Details from the Domain of Spiritual Science at the end of
this book, Chapter VII